Cultural Sensitivity

Who's Your Inner European?

2006-06-16T00:02:00.000+03:00

Take the test!

Who's Your Inner European?

Is really interesting and.. cultural!
Kisses!

Ten Steps Toward Cultural Sensitivity

2006-05-04T10:47:00.000+03:00

1. Take the initiative to make contact with the "international", the "outsider", the "foreigner" even if language is a problem at first.

2. Show respect for their culture and language. They may be in culture shock and grieving over the "loss" of their culture or at least the fear of losing their cultural identity. Ask, "How would I feel if I were in their shoes?"

3. Learn how to pronounce names correctly. Their name is as important to them as yours is to you. Practice saying it until you get close to how it should be pronounced.

4. Be sensitive to their feelings about their homeland. Developing nations are not as poor, backward or uneducated as North Americans tend to think.

5. When speaking English, do so slowly and clearly. Remember, raising your voice does not make English more understandable.

6. Be yourself. Show that you care about them as people and that you honestly want to help.

7. Take time to listen. If you don't understand, or you are not understood, take time to find out why. Explain or ask questions. A key question might be, "Would you help me understand?"

8. Be careful about promises. In English we express the subjunctive (possibility, probability or contingency) in a way that is sometimes misunderstood by internationals.

9. The key ingredient to developing and maintaining a long-term relationship with internationals is old-fashioned friendship built of mutual respect and a desire for understanding.

10. Don't allow cultural differences (preferences) to become the basis for criticism and judgments. Differences are neither good nor bad. What we do with them is the key.

On Danish doings

2006-03-25T10:50:00.000+02:00

This is much related with the latest Muslim cartoons, still it is interesting to grasp the other cultural issues that are stated between the lines...

here you go:

The ideal island

The imagery used certainly made Denmark come off as some latter-day Aryan nation, full of blond-haired, blue-eyed Übermenschen, happy to live on their utopian island.

Never mind that Denmark is home to immigrants from all over the world of all faiths and cultures, who have found happiness and a safe haven for themselves and their families taking full advantage of what Denmark has to offer.

Read more about it here.

Quality of life: a new religion?

2006-03-19T22:42:00.000+02:00

Values like “peace”, “human rights”, “protection of the natural environment”, " fighting poverty” indicate a deeper reorientation in western attitudes to the world. It might be in Europe the significance of a new moral dimension in economic and social life.

international management behaviour. part 2

2006-03-08T12:26:00.000+02:00

Bridging Differences Through Communication

Understanding the lens through which others see the world is an enormous aid to intercultural effectiveness. But this understanding provides little benefit as long as it remains latent. It must be put into use to help the flow of ideas among people in a conversation, a team, or an organization. The goal of these interpersonal flows is effective communication, or the transfer of meaning from one person to another as it was intended by the first person.
Resolving miscommunication depends, in large part, on a manager’s willingness to explain the problem rather than to blame the other person. And the quality of the explanation depends, in a large part, on the manager’s ability to map the other person;s culture with respect to his or her own.
There are three skills important to effective communication in a cross-cultural setting: preparing, decentering and recentering.

Prepare

Preparing is about setting the ground for communication. The most important place to set the ground is in one’s own mind. Two attitudes are especially predictive of effective communication: motivation and confidence. Motivation is having the will to communicate across a cultural boundary both to be understood and to understand others. The confidence part of preparing is to believe that it is possible to overcome any barriers and communicate effectively.
These attitudes may sound simple to control, but their manifestation is complicated by some psychological tendencies we all have. They are inherent to our nature and normally serve us well, but tend to slip us up in cross-cultural interaction. More specifically, we tend to assume:
The other person sees the situation the same way as we do.
The other person is making the same assumptions as we are.
The other person is ( or should be ) experiencing the same feelings as we are.
The communication situation has no relationship to past events.
The other person’s understanding is ( or should be ) based on our own logic, not their feelings.
If a problem occurs, it is the other person who is the one who has the ‘problem’ or does not understand the logic of the situation.
Other cultures are changing and becoming, or want to become, more like our culture and, therefore, the other person is becoming more like us.

Decenter

Decentering is actively pushing yourself away from your own “center” and moving into the mind of the other person to send messages in a way the other will understand, and to listen in a way that allows you to understand them from their own point of view. The fundamental idea of decentering is empathy: feeling and understanding as another person does.
There are two main elements to decentering. The first is perspective taking, which is the skill of being able to see things from the other person’s point of view to the extend that you can speak and listen that way. The second is explaining without blame. When problems in communication do occur, it is critical that one blames the other in a personal way, but that all parties seek an explanation in the situation- the differences in initial starting assumptions.

Recenter

The final step to effective communication is recentering, or establishing a common reality and agreeing on common rules. Like the other elements, establishing a common reality is easier said than done. But it is much easier to see the need to do so, if one is aware of the types of differences between your own values and those of others.

Integrating to Manage and Build on the Differences

Building Participation

To realize the benefits of different perspectives and ideas ( the latent possibilities among the multicultural membership of a group ), it is necessary to express the ideas. Not all the cultures are equally predisposed to offer their ideas openly. People from cultures with a strong hierarchical orientation, for example, are not likely to put forth their ideas in a group containing a direct superior or a higher-status person. In contrast, people from individualistic cultures are more likely to assert their ideas. The first challenge for a multicultural group, then, is to ensure that all the ideas are heard.

Resolving Disagreements

As more ideas from various viewpoints are expressed, there is an increasing likelihood that there will be disagreements. The way these conflicts are handled, then, becomes the next cross-cultural challenge. Even the way conflict gets expressed, quite apart from how it gets resolved, varies in different cultural traditions. In many cultures it is deemed inappropriate to express conflict openly.

Building on Ideas

Even if the mapping framework is well understood, the communication skills are well developed, and participation and conflict issues are managed effectively, there is still a key component to realizing the potential of a multicultural group, namely, moving forward and build in the ideas. The main idea is to encourage the exploration of ideas with the conscious attempt to invent new ideas, to build on the ideas initially surfaced.

hello you, people of the world!!

2006-03-07T00:54:00.001+02:00

I am making my "debut" on this blog as a simple @'s Culture Sensitivity Task Force member. Why me? I don't exactly know… maybe because lately I am hunted by a thought that keeps coming to my mind...as Katie Melua’s song says:

“There are six BILLION people in the world
More or less
and it makes me feel quite small…”

Can you imagine? How big the world really is, how few we know about it? I feel as if I kept my eyes closed and I am ashamed in the same time of own my ignorance…
The real truth is that first of all I want “me” to be more cultural sensitive and then maybe to open a little bit the eyes of others if they allow me to!!

Did I ever told you that when I was a little girl I was dreaming and hoping to find out that I was adopted??(and I wasn’t a molested child, believe me:))? I just wanted my real mom to be... Patricia Kass (vive la France!!) and I was practicing the few words in knew in French in front of the mirror so that when her tours would have been over, to take me and the ‘other parents’ (I also truly loved them!!) back were I belonged: in France!!!
...this till I found some pictures with my mom as a child! we looked to much alike! i was in denial for a while but I had to face reality: I was the daughter of my parents and a Romanian!! And now I say is not bad at all!!

So after all I am also one of the people of the world, I can assume my own culture and keep interest in other cultures. I want to know, to understand, to learn at least something about how the world goes around for the other 6 billion people in the world!!

So please don’t tie my eyes and help me by posting your opinions and experiences on this blog!!

International management behavior

2006-03-01T15:52:00.000+02:00

The influence of culture on management behavior.

There is a link between successful global business and cultural awareness and sensitivity. Many management concepts, techniques and systems developed and tought in business schools are based on cultural beliefs, values and assumptions about how managers should behave, and they work well in the countries in which they were developed. However, these concepts may not work in as intended in other cultures. For example, management by objectives (MBO), a standard North American management tool, is based on the assumption that subordinates will share their objectives with their superior. This is an unrealistic assumption in many countries that have strong status differentials and that maintain hierachies.
There is a difference between “global” and “international” when refering to companies. For example, an international company will have mostly autonomous units in each country and region, but a global company may split the activities of a single product’s value chane across several countries and treat the globe as one unit for that product. The most effective managers, whatever their company’s approach, manage as if the companies were global. They make strategic decisions taking into consideration what is best for the company and for the client and they implement ideas in the way that is best for the people carrying out the decisions. These managers run the global business and are global managers. There are four major types of expertise demonstrated by effective global managers: strategic (high knowledge about global business and ability to integrate new knowledge into a big picture view of the company, its industry, and its invironments) , adaptive (felxibility and adaptability, dynamism) , interpersonal (communication and team-work, negociation, leadership, conflict resolution), and cross-cultural (strong knowledge about theior own and other culture).

Intercultural Effectiveness in Global Management

An assumption is an unquestioned, taken for granted belief about the world and how it works. Assumptions allow us to function and perform effectively every day, without thinking about how we are doing what we are doing. Assumpions help create our workd view, or the cognitive environment in which we operate. If people did not make innumerable assumptions about the world, they would be paralized by their need to constantly inquire about the meaning of events and the motives of others. Assumpions influence our perceptions, which are our interpretation of events and behaviours or the meaning that the events and behaviors have on us.
Assumptions influence our perceptions, which are our interpretations of events and behaviors or the meaning that the events and behaviors have on us. The expression “ we see what we want to see and we hear what we want to hear” is a reflection of how one’s assumption affect one’s perception.
The point is that we act based on the world we perceive, the world we see through the Describe, Interpret, Evaluate sequence. Our assumptions of the world influence a lot our actions and the way we think of others’ actions.
There are sittuations in which aour assumptions equal our perception and this means harmony and confort. But, when they don’t equal, the tendency to make perceptions congruent with assumptions becomes a source of misunderstanding between people in the same cultural milieu or come from different cultures.
When it comes to groups, the assumpion-perception process tends to turn our, ussualy quite badly. The experiences that lead to negative evaluations and actions tend to multiply with the number of people and intensity of the task, resolting in a disaster in terms of group relations. But some other studies have also shown that multicultural groups have some advantages too. They have been shown to be more creative, to develop more and better alternatives for resolving a problem, and more and better criteria for evaluating the alternatives.

There are three basic skills that by being executed well make the multicultural interactions between individuals or among team members result in high performance. These are Mapping to understand cultural differences among members, Bridging to communicate effectively among members, and Integrating to bring perspectives together and build on them.
A cultural map, rather than showing streets and highways, provides in formation about a group’s characteristics and behavior in terms of observable patterns as discovered by experience and by research and it provides accurate information about the ways in which cultures differ that are important to international business.
The Cultural Orientations Framework (COF) is a useful tool that can promote deeper cultural awareness if used properly. In order to make it work effectively some things must be taken into consideration beforehand: -not all people will react the same way, because of the existance of subcultures, cultural homogenity in any country can’t be assumed; -personality must not be confused with culture, one is an individual based concept while the other is a group based concept; cultures are dynamic; -culture does not necessarily mean national culture or country; -a person may be o member of many cultures symultaneously (nation, religion, school, gender, and so on) and finally –tehre is a gap between understanding and behaving which presents a bareer to using any framework for effectively adapting to other cultures.

Peoples relationship with the environment reflects how people in a society ought to orient themselves to the world around them, and to the supernatural. Three main variations seem to exist in the human experience: subjugation to the environment (people see themselves dominated by physical forces and subject to the will of a Supreme Being; harmony with the environment (the imperative to behave in concert with the physical environment and other systems in the world aroud us); and mastery over nature (with enough time, money and brains everything is achieveble, even the landing of a person on the moon).

The concept of relationaships among people is concerned with the responsibility one has to and for others. There are also three main variations existing between people: -individualism (North America, Australia and New Zealand, and parts of Europe); -group orientation ( Mediterranian, South America, Asian cultures) and –hierarchical( aristocratic society and caste systems).
Human activity: desirable focus of activity:
o the “being: orientation is characterized by spontaneity. One acts out feelings as they are experienced. This is also known as the Dionysian mode ( the Greek God of wine and good timesJ)
o the “doing” orientation is the Promethean mode. Prometheus stole de fire from the Olympus and gave it to humans to use. As punishment, he was chained to a rock and tourmented by eagles.
o The “thinking” orientation is the Apollonian mode, in which the senses are moderated by thought and mind and body are balanced.
The activity dimension affects how people approach work and leasure, how preocupied they are with their work. In a strongly doing-oriented culture, people are more likely to view work and work related activities as a central focus of their lives, and the decision criteria are pragmatic. In the being-dominated culture it is more likely that decision criteria are emotinal and the degree of concern for output is variable. In cultures with a dominant thinking orientation decisions are more likely to be taken based on rational criteria and output is measured against balanced objectives.

The belief about basic human nature reflects one’s belief about the inherent character of the human species. This could mean that one might believe people around him are evil, good, neutral (neither good nor evil) ar mixed (a combination between good and evil). The most obvious impact on business of the human nature value may be on control systems. A dominant evil orientation is likely to contribute a tight control system based on an underlying suspicion of people. Cultural orientations dominated by a neutral or mixed value are likely to produce moderately tight controls, with modifications based on managers’ experience with the people involved. In a culture dominated by good value is likely to produce loose, information based contrl style and an informal, collaborative organization climate.

Orientation to Time. If the dominant value of a certain society is past-oriented the planning will be based on extension of past behavior, the decision criteria as precedent and the reward system historically determined. In a present-oriented culture the planning is made on a short-term, the decisions are taken considering only the current impact and the reward system is currently contracted. In a future-based culture managers make long-term planning and the decisions’ criteria are the desired effects, the reward system being contingent on performance.

Use of space. We choose the words private, mixed , public to apply to the variations of this orientation. The private perspective holds that space is for an occupants benefit, and it defines a large area surrounding the occupant as part of that person’s territory. In contrast the public orientation sees space as available for anyone’s use. The sence of territory is small, and defensive action to guard against incasion is taken only in the immediate area around the occupant. The mixed orientation is blend of the private and public perspectives – an intermediate position. The spatial dimention can have an impact on communication, influence, and interaction patterns in physical realities such as office and building layout. Managers operating in a culture dominated by private orientation are more likely to find themselves communicating on a one-to-one basis in a secretive, serial pattern. They are more confortable having a fair amount of distance between them when talking directly to each other. On the other hand, managers interacting in a culture dominated by a public orientation are more likely to engage in a wide variety of interactions using an open style. Their conversations may involve several people symultaneously and physically close relations will not be uncommon. Cultures with a mixed orientation influence managers to be more selective in their communications, with moderately separated space between people and somewhat more organized, semiprivate arrangements.
The space-orientation value may also apply to physical goods, property, or information. People with a dominantly private orientation are likely to have a strong sense of ownership of things as well as of space. This manifests itself in the degree to which physical items are shared or viewed as community property. Links between these orientations and forms of economic activity, such as capitalism and socialism, are also posible.

Europe's perspective

2006-02-27T21:03:00.000+02:00

According to prof. Geert Hofstede Europe's best cultural researchers study a different culture having at the core of the object of research a common trait according to the reseracher's country of origin.

Latin Europe: power
Central Europe, including Germany: truth
Eastern Europe: efficiency
Northern Europe: change

Individual vs society approach

2006-02-27T20:40:00.000+02:00

A scientific paper (Segall, Dasen, Berry and Poorting (1990)) argues that when it is abou cultural research the steps should be the following:

Begin research in your own country
Transport it to the other country
Discover the other culture
Compare the two cultures
If the cultures overlap, the the comparison is possible and then the result is a derived etic.

The conclusion: When you go abroad, be aware of the characteristics of your own culture. (If you need a start point in what to take into consideration check prof. Geert Hofstede's cultural dimensions). Futher on you will need strong objectivity skills to make the difference between the individual's features and the whole society's traits.

In order to understand the individual you need to take into consideration three pyramidal 'constants':

Culture: the cultural background and the upbringing will affect a individual's opinions and decision.
Company: considerate the organizational and professional culture of a foreign colleague. You will understand better where the gap is and what do you need to do in order to cover it.
Character: each individual has his own values, motives and moods.

2006-02-26T00:34:00.000+02:00

This one is a joke in Romanian. For the potential Latin language readers, try and see if your language is simillar to Romanian:) ;)

For the ones who know Romanian enjoy:

Stimate om alb ! Eu, cand am venit pe lume, eram negru. Am crescut mare si sunt tot negru. Ma duc la plaja si raman negru. Cand mi-e frig, sunt tot negru. Cand ceva ma infurie, raman negru. Cand sunt bolnav, fata mi-e neagra. Cand voi muri, pielea-mi va fi neagra. In timp ce tu, omule alb… Cand ai venit pe lume erai roz, Ai crescut si ai devenit alb, Te duci la plaja si devii maro, Cand ti-e frig, te nvinetesti, Cand te nfurii te nrosesti la fata, Cand te nbolnavesti, pielea ti-e galbena, Cand vei muri pielea-ti va deveni cenusie…. … si, dupa toate acestea, mai ai si tupeul sa ma numesti “OM DE CULOARE

2006-02-25T23:59:00.000+02:00

It's all about understanding.

Well actually theory says that the core of cultural disenssion are the values.

This blog is meant to be a collection of theories about culture, graphs, useful links, cultural based jokes.